Still oppression, 50 years later

Thursday

Sep 5, 2013 at 9:36 AM

To the Editor | Thank you for printing Dr. Martin Luther King's speech. You did a wonderful service to this community, who are profoundly ignorant regarding the issues that he raised in that speech that are clearly still relevant. There is still voter suppression and a Supreme Court that enacted that ability by individual states to continue to suppress and deny people the right to vote based on their race. This is the highest form of treason and unamericanism to deny the vote to citizens of the United States.

I had the great good fortune to be able to attend this march in Washington. I was a member of a union delegation of toy workers from New York City and was between high school and college. The spirit of democracy was very strong then and it overwhelmed the radical elements who wanted to do things to undermine democracy. The shame is that it is 50 years from that day, many states run by old white men are reinstituting restrictive abortion and voting laws and are making those of us who defended democracy look foolish.

I thought that lawmakers took an oath to defend and uphold the constitution and laws of the United States. Isn't the most important element of democracy to insist that people have the right to vote?